


Always

by spacs



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Death, F/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-31
Updated: 2015-03-31
Packaged: 2018-03-20 12:58:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3651189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacs/pseuds/spacs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They should've had more time. There was always supposed to be more time for the young and foolishly in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always

**Author's Note:**

> It's the first Dragon Age piece I've written. I've got more stewing in my brain, but Tamlen... Don't get me started on Tamlen. So it's just a piece about how my Mahariel would have reacted. I was very upset about the lack of reaction from the companions and from Mahariel. I was so upset when it happened and there was just nothing to show that in the game. Don't get me started on going back to the mirror in Awakening. But I wanted to get this out because I love Nora and I love Tamlen and I just feel like they deserve a story. So it probably won't be the last you see of them from me.

"Always loved you... I'm so sorry."

She closed her eyes. She didn't want to see Tamlen lunge at her and she would not strike him down. This was a fate she had brought upon herself and was ready to accept it.

All she heard was sword running through skin, but there was no pain. What followed was a breath from Tamlen and her eyes flew open. Alistair stood in front of her, weapon in hand and running with dark, tainted blood. She felt the man turn to her with concern, dropping the blade. Alistair gripped her arms, searching her face. She faintly heard him asking her, "What were you thinking?" But her eyes went to Tamlen, lying on the ground. She fell to her knees and pushing her way around Alistair to take the other elf into her arms. He looked up at her, the life inside them fading. His hand lifted weakly to brush her cheek before dropping back to the grass. His eyes stared at her face, empty.

She felt as if the breath had been knocked out of her. It took her a lifetime to learn how to breathe again. Her eyes were painfully dry and her voice was caught in her throat. This was Tamlen. He had been standing in front of her just moments ago.

"Nora..." came the hesitant voice of Alistair behind her.

She could not answer. When the man put a hand on her shoulder her breath and voice returned. She whipped around, keeping her arms around Tamlen, to glare at him. "What have you done?"

The venom in her voice and the fury on her face made Alistair withdraw and stumble back a pace. It was his turn to lose his voice as others from the group gathered loosely around them. Leliana was the first to brave a step toward her, but Nora only snarled, " _Leave_!"

As they all left, her gaze softened as she turned back to Tamlen. The others began clearing the camp of the bodies and she heard soft murmurs, undoubtedly about her. At least they all had the decency to leave her be - even Morrigan's voice stayed low.

Nora studied Tamlen's face. It was still his - dark with taint, sagged with pain - but still his. His hair was so thin it almost looked as if it wasn't there. She could see his vallaslin colouring his skin. It was harder to see than it had been before, but she knew the lines so well, even after all this time. Her fingers traced the ink almost entirely from memory as she remembered how jealous he was when she was honored with her vallaslin first, yet he was still the last one she saw before entering the tent and the first to congratulate her when she'd finished. He had spent days studying her face and the lines, talking about how different she looked - more adult, even more beautiful. After he had received his she teased him about the curls on his cheek. She told him they made his lips seem more puckered and pouty. That was the first time he kissed her.

Tears would not come. She stared into his lifeless eyes, silently pleading with him to come back. "I'm sorry," she whispered as her hands slowly lifted to close his lids. Her fingers lingered on his face. She closed her eyes and remembered him as he was before they found the mirror: a playful smile on his face, brightening his eyes with happiness and mischeif. His light coloured hair ruffled as they ran across the forest floor together. Her hand closed over his and she remembered how his fingers felt against hers; the way he would run them over her hand and arms while admiring her skill with a bow and a blade. She swallowed the bile that rose in her throat as she recalled the feeling of his lips on hers and how they knew exactly how to move. They had been one in the same, two sides of the same coin. She had Tamlen and Tamlen had her. That was the way it was always supposed to be.

Fate, as Zevran would say, is such a tricky whore.

Tamlen would have liked Zevran.

She might have been sitting there for mere minutes, maybe hours. Things had gone quiet in the camp and a glance over her shoulder told her that Leliana had taken first watch alone. Everyone had retreated to their areas of the camp or tents to rest. But for Nora, there would be no rest.

The elf stood, keeping her arms around Tamlen. She was strong, but Tamlen had always been heavy with muscle despite being slight in size. She struggled to keep him in her arms, but she managed to carry him to a private area and away from the prying eyes of her companions.

She retreated briefly to camp to get a shovel from a disheveled and shaken Bodahn then returned to Tamlen's side.

Nora started digging.

As she dug she just remembered. She remembered everything about him. A part of her felt like it had been ripped from her body; Tamlen had always been the other half of her whole. There had always been that hope that he had survived and reached the clan after she left. After she stopped looking. She did not want this closure. She did not want this pain. And it was then she felt the tears fall.

The tears were hot and she cried silently. All she could do was dig. Her brow moistened with a thin sweat as she worked, but she ignored it. She ignored the pains in her side and reminded herself that she deserved this. A quiet sob fell past her lips as she struggled for breath between working and the tears.

She did not want this pain.

Alistair found her. She knew it would be only a matter of time before he looked for her, but she could not say she was glad. This was something she had to do alone. She only wanted to be with Tamlen.

"Who... who was that?" he asked, watching her work.

Nora paused, reaching up to wipe the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. She didn't look up at Alistair. "Someone I once knew," she answered shortly. She controlled her voice as best as she could and turned her face from the man. She did not want him to see her cry.

"Tamlen?" he asked quietly after a moment's pause. Nora hesitated at the sound of Tamlen's name passing Alistair's lips then stubbornly kept working. "Duncan told me of him," Alistair explained. "He said there was another elf with you when..." The ex-templar trailed off with a sad sigh. "This is what happens when the taint goes unchecked. It's better this way... it was a mercy."

Nora grit her teeth. She didn't want to talk or argue with Alistair. This was her burden. Tamlen was her loss. She did not need his words. So she stayed quiet and did not acknowledge him. The sound of the metal on dry ground was ringing in her ears... the sound of metal on glass as the mirror shattered beneath Duncan's blade... the sound of metal cutting through flesh and a final breath that followed.

The shovel fell from her grasp, her hands shaking violently as grief ran over her. She didn't realize she was on her knees until her fingers gripped the dirt and slid beneath her nails.

Steady hands found her shoulders as Alistair tried to draw her close. Nora resisted his pull. "Don't," she said weakly. "Leave me. Please." The plea came out as a whisper, a stark contrast to the anger that had been there before. "Please."

After a moment's hesitation, his hands fell away and she felt him leave her side. As she cried, she felt his eyes on her. He would be there when she was ready and in that she found the smallest bit of comfort.

Once she was able to stand, Nora swept her red hair away from her face and took a deep breath. She continued to dig.

_"You have beauty and skill, ma vhenan."_

_"Don't call me that."_

_"Why?"_

_"You're my best friend, Tamlen."_

_"And do you not love me? Do best friends often steal a kiss whenever they can?"_

_"I'll have to get another one and find out."_

_"You would have no fun without me."_

_"Just... not yet, Tamlen. Not yet."_

_"If you say so, lethallan."_

They should've had more time. There was always supposed to be more time for the young and foolishly in love. The ones that snuck off to get into the worst trouble just to see the other smile - they were supposed to have more time. They were supposed to live forever. The stolen kisses were supposed to become lasting kisses, not just longings that went unspoken for the sake of the thrill. They should've had more time. Tamlen was supposed to have more time.

Alistair did not offer to help place Tamlen in the grave. She would not have let him. Nora could wield two swords in both hands. She could carry Tamlen. She should have taken him away from those ruins, but she liked it when he smiled as they discovered new things. She should have pulled him away from the mirror, but his curiosity was one of the reasons she loved him.

_She loved him_.

She stared at him as he was now: darkened, blighted skin, blood permanently staining his armor, his hair thinned and almost completely gone. He had suffered greatly and she had done nothing to stop it. This was her fault.

Nora looked over him once more. He wasn't in pain any longer and his last view of this life had been her face. If she squinted her eyes, she could pretend he looked as he once did. Content. She leaned down, brushing her fingers over his face as she stole one final kiss. "And I always loved you, _ma vhenan_ ," she whispered to him.

Once the grave had been filled, she retreated to her tent. Before she left the forest with Duncan, she had taken a seed from one of the trees to remind her of her clan in the days that were to come. And now she would leave it behind for Tamlen.

She sat there until dawn and Alistair finally broke his vigil by handing her their map. "I've marked this location," he told her. "After this is all over, you can come back here."

Nora stared at the parchment he presented her, taking it slowly from his hands. Her eyes went from the page to the ground. It somehow looked darker in the sunlight than it had during the night.

She folded the map and gripped it in her hand as she stood. Her eyes connected briefly with Alistair's. "We should pack up camp," she said. Her voice was hollow and hoarse, but it mattered little. "We've got to get to Haven before nightfall."


End file.
